Manchester City have made Nottingham Forest midfielder Elliot Anderson their top priority ahead of the summer transfer window opening on Monday
We are just three days away from England’s opening match of the World Cup and Manchester City are not in a position they would like to be. Ideally by this point, Enzo Maresca would have been appointed and Nottingham Forest midfielder Elliot Anderson would have agreed to be his first signing.
Instead, neither man are through the door leading to understandable concerns from supporters. For what it is worth, there is no indication that City are going to miss out on either man at this stage. Maresca’s arrival seems all but done, albeit the pesky negotiations with Chelsea are taking longer than anticipated.
As for Anderson, there is still a good feeling at City that the deal will be completed. However, they have been faced with the unenviable task of negotiating with Nottingham Forest’s owner Evangelos Marinakis. The 58-year-old is infamous for his hard-line approach to transfer negotiations. This week, City felt the full weight of that.
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A second bid worth a total of £120m, £106m of which would be up front, was rejected by Forest. Their stance is straightforward, they want a higher fee up front. This makes sense from the East Midlands club’s perspective as add-ons are no guarantee of income.
However, some City fans are concerned Anderson’s price tag has risen to such an extent that a deal is unfeasible. They also fear in this post-Pep Guardiola landscape, the Blues are spending too much money on one player alone. But inside the recruitment team at the Etihad Stadium, this is not their first rodeo.
If we cast our minds back to 2017, City were competing with Liverpool for the signing of Virgil van Dijk. At the time, the Dutch defender was a top prospect having impressed at Southampton and Celtic before that.
But the similarities to Anderson do not end there. Like the Forest midfielder, Van Dijk’s club had set a non-negotiable price tag for their centre-back.
The Saints were insistent on £75m and would not budge. In City’s Amazon Prime series, All or Nothing, chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak can be seen discussing a move for Van Dijk with then sporting director Txiki Begiristain.
“Come on, you cannot be serious,” the frustrated chairman said. “Ultimately, if it makes sense for us, we will do it.
“If it doesn’t make sense, we are perfectly comfortable in walking away. To do that, there’s only a few clubs in the world that can do that.”
As we know, City would eventually decide to walk away and allow Liverpool to sign Van Dijk. Meanwhile, the Blues agreed a £57m deal for Aymeric Laporte.
It would be fair to say that Van Dijk has had a greater impact on Liverpool than Laporte had on City. But, their decision to move on from Van Dijk set a clear precedent.
Al Mubarak showed at the very start of Guardiola’s tenure that City would not be held hostage by a selling club. If they did not feel the transfer was worth the money, they would not go ahead with it.
The same applies now to the Anderson transfer. If City do not think the England international is worth a larger up front fee, they will not complete the deal for the sake of it.
Replacing Bernardo Silva this summer is the Blues’ top priority but City’s hierarchy have built up enough trust to decide whether Anderson is worth an even higher bid or not. If it is deemed that he isn’t, City won’t be afraid to move onto the next target.
In this uncertain landscape at City, fans may have to put faith in the club to do what is right, once again.
